


The Right Motivation (1/1)

by leashy_bebes



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-07
Updated: 2010-12-07
Packaged: 2017-10-25 18:55:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,203
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/273627
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leashy_bebes/pseuds/leashy_bebes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Merlin might only be twenty four but he's already starting to doubt that 'adults' is the right collective noun for a room of eighteen year olds (most days he favours 'headache'). Maybe one or two of them think he's cool, but even twenty four adoring students couldn't have made it okay when number twenty five was Arthur bloody Pendragon.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Right Motivation (1/1)

**Author's Note:**

> Arthur is an undergrad and Merlin is his TA, so it's...legal but potentially skeevy? Unbeta'd, so feel free to point out any glaring typos etc.

Merlin leafs through the papers that have made their way to the front of the class and bites back a sigh. "Arthur? I don't see your essay."

"No," Arthur Pendragon agrees from the back of the room, leaning back in his chair and shrugging. "Haven't done it yet."

"I see. A word after class, if you would," Merlin says, before cutting the lights, starting the DVD and retreating to sit on a desk by the door.

Arthur bloody Pendragon, he thinks ruefully. When Merlin's supervisor Gaius had insisted that tutoring first year seminars was _not_ an optional aspect of his bursary conditions, he'd nearly had a fit. He's never, ever, in all his life, wanted to be a teacher of any kind. His best friend Gwen had talked him down though, tea and a stiff talking to about how they'd be adults, they'd _want_ to be there, they'd be interested and intelligent, and think he was cool and brainy.

She's an awful liar. Merlin might only be twenty four but he's already starting to doubt that 'adults' is the right collective noun for a roomful of eighteen year olds (most days he favours 'headache'). As for wanting to be there – well, maybe, if the class isn't too early or too late (before 11 and after 3) but mainly they want to be in the pub. Interested, sometimes. Intelligent, mostly. Maybe one or two of them think he's cool, but even twenty four adoring students couldn't have made it okay when number twenty five was Arthur bloody Pendragon.

It had been bad enough when Arthur was just an inappropriately gorgeous smart-arse in Merlin's Monday morning and Thursday afternoon classes, when he was full of clever answers and difficult questions. But then he'd, for whatever reason, decided that he wanted Merlin, and had set about pursuing him with all the determination of a rich brat far too used to getting his own way. The first time he'd asked Merlin to go for a drink with him, Merlin had barely realised Arthur was coming onto him, just smiled and said something about _not really supposed to socialise with students_ because. Well, he probably wasn't.

Anyway, he'd been halfway to the pub to meet his flatmate Gwaine for a beer before realisation had dawned. Gwaine, in typically useful form had laughed, shrugged, laughed again, and asked 'good looking?' And then he laughed one more time when Merlin let his head fall onto the bar and groaned 'stupidly'.

Arthur had asked again, and Merlin had said no. Then Arthur had started turning up to Merlin's every office hour with perfectly legitimate questions until Merlin let his guard down a tiny bit. And _then_ Arthur turned up one day and said that he'd scoured the academic regulations and hadn't seen anything that says he can't take Merlin for a drink. Merlin's office is tiny and Arthur was close, confident and gorgeous, and Merlin _might_ (God help him) have said something about his personal moral code. The point is he said no. Again. (And again, and again.)

But then he'd bumped into Arthur in a club in town – which is exactly what he'd _told_ Gwaine would happen – and _things_ had happened under the influence of alcohol. And then they'd sort of carried on happening, without the alcohol, and now Merlin is in _way_ over his head. There might be nothing in the rules forbidding it, but Merlin is fairly sure Gaius would still string him up if he ever found out. Arthur doesn't seem to think there's anything even slightly off about it. And Merlin – well, in all honesty, most of the time he's too busy being slightly blinded by lust to really think about how monumentally stupid it all is.

The DVD section of the class comes to an end and Merlin switches the lights on again, moving to sit cross-legged on the front desk this time, leading a discussion of the case study they just watched. In truth, the session pretty much leads itself once he starts them off, which is unfortunate, because it gives Merlin too much chance to become aware of Arthur, sitting in the back of the room, his eyes never leaving Merlin. He catches Merlin looking once and gives a self-satisfied smile before leaning back in his chair and twirling his pen around between his finger and thumb.

When the class ends, Merlin sort of wishes he could just pretend to have forgotten about Arthur's missing essay. But the thing is, he needs to establish that while Arthur's a student and can fuck up, and skive off classes, and neglect to do his work if he wants, but he really, really _can't_ do any of those things and expect Merlin to cut him any slack. Arthur hangs back anyway, and when the door swings shut behind the last student to leave he heads over to the desk where Merlin is packing away his stuff.

He nearly leaps out of his skin when Arthur curls a hand around his elbow and leans in for a kiss. Merlin moves back hastily, glancing over at the door – at least the blind is still down over the window.

"What do you think you're doing?" he demands.

"Kissing you?" Arthur suggests.

"Well _stop it_! Jesus Christ, Arthur."

Arthur just grins at him and takes a step closer, easily swallowing up the distance Merlin had put between them.

"I'm serious," Merlin says, moving to stand behind the desk, desperate for a little space between them, so Arthur can't make his brain go all stupid. Arthur just leans over the desk in an effort to steal a kiss.

Merlin leans back and says, "Oh, for God's sake. _No_. You're like a – "

" _What_ , Merlin? What am I like? Do tell. Oh, _please_ tell me you were going to say, 'dog with a bone', because I have a perfect response lined up and – "

"You're like someone who wants to lose me my fucking job," Merlin says.

Arthur rolls his eyes. "You hate this job."

"Well. Okay, yes," Merlin admits. "But I do rather like my PhD, so if you could please stop doing things that would get me kicked out, that'd be great."

"How many times, idiot? There's no rule against it."

Merlin sighs and rubs his forehead. "Yes, okay, fine. Just – just sit down," he says firmly, and Arthur makes an interested face.

"For someone who has _issues_ with being my teacher, you're certainly engineering a very _naughty schoolboy in detention_ scenario here," he says as he folds himself into a chair and looks up at Merlin with deliberately wide eyes.

"Arthur, just _stop_ ," Merlin begs, but he can't hide the fact that his lip twitches in amusement. "Where's your essay?"

Arthur raises his eyebrows. "Well I did pencil in some time to do it on Wednesday, but – and I'm not sure if you remember or not – I spent the evening sucking your cock in a pub toilet."

"That wasn't all evening," Merlin says, and Arthur laughs uproariously. _Damn it_ , Merlin thinks. He shouldn't have skived off that training session on Managing Difficult Students. Somehow he doubts they'd have covered someone like Arthur, but maybe that's where they teach the secret to the assured 'I Am In Charge Here' air that other staff seem to give off.

"When I was your age," Merlin tries again.

"What, like, five whole years ago? What _was_ the world like back then, Grandad?"

"When I was an undergraduate," Merlin corrects. "I was able to get laid _and_ complete my assignments. Now clearly, as you can only deal with one of those, well. Your education comes first."

"You – " Arthur still looks far too amused.

"I'm serious. We can do this, but you _cannot_ use it as an excuse to slack off – "

"Merlin – "

" – and you can't expect me to cut you any extra slack because of it – "

"Merlin, I was _joking_ ," Arthur protests. "Look, I just had a lot of work on this week and I didn't get around to it."

Merlin sighs and nods. "Okay. Alright. Email me a copy by the end of the day."

It's no more than he'd do – once – for any other student, and Arthur nods, looking relieved.

"So, can I go now, _sir_?"

"Oh my god, I don't care if you do every piece of work on time for the rest of the year, I'm never touching you again," Merlin groans.

Arthur laughs as he stands up, grabbing his bag and before Merlin can even blink Arthur's rounded the desk and is about to kiss him. Merlin pushes him away lightly.

"I mean it. Back off."

Arthur looks crestfallen. "Seriously?"

"Seriously."

For a minute Arthur looks like he might argue but he just frowns instead, hitches his bag over his shoulder and leaves the room. He shoots Merlin a last glance before he goes, and it's obviously meant to be seductive and irresistible, and well. Seductive, yes. Irresistible, not so much.

Because Merlin is a _professional_.

***

Except, apparently, he's not _that_ professional, because by half eight that night he hasn't done any marking, he hasn't done any work of his own, and Gwaine has given him up as a bad job and headed out for the evening. On his way out the door, he shouts that Merlin should 'call that boy-toy of yours to take that miserable look off your face'. Merlin chucks a sofa cushion at him, but the door's already closing.

He has to admit that Gwaine might have a point, because Merlin hasn't stopped thinking about Arthur all day. He's gorgeous, and it doesn't help at all that he's just the type Merlin spent his useless, frustrated school days lusting after. But he's meant to be a proper adult now. He has a (shared) flat, he pays (most) of his bills on time, he cooks (most days) and cleans (most weeks). When he goes out with his friends he orders pints instead of the strangest shots he can find on the drinks list. He's meant to be sensible. He's certainly meant to be too sensible to have his head turned by a bloody student.

But Arthur's just...captivating. Merlin found after a few months that he can tell when students know the answer, just from the looks on their faces, even if they don't offer a response. And Arthur _always_ knows the answers. The very first time Merlin taught him, Arthur had offered an instinctive critique of the scientific method which had definite echoes of some of Feyerabend's work. He didn't have the jargon, but he made his point well, and Merlin had been nothing short of delighted, playing devil's advocate in his responses while Arthur groped for the words to express himself, and the majority of the class looked lost. He might be five years younger than Merlin, but he has this combination of intelligence, and rock-solid self confidence, and cocky humour, and it makes Merlin feel like he's the one adrift, like he's missed a step in the dark.

"Git," Merlin mutters unhappily, and he goes so far as pulling out his phone and scrolling down to Arthur's number. Except _no_ , damn it, he tells himself fiercely. Deciding to give the night up as already wasted, Merlin's on the way to the kitchen for a beer when the doorbell goes.

"I swear, Gwaine," Merlin mutters, getting louder as he approaches the door. "If you don't start taking your keys with you, I'm going to start – "

When he opens the door it's not Gwaine though, it's Arthur, leaning against the wall with a smile quirking his lips.

"Going to start what?" he asks.

"Nothing, I – What are you _doing_ here?" Merlin demands, and he can't help looking over Arthur's shoulder. It's ridiculous and paranoid, because the flat is a good three bus trips from the campus, and Merlin's never seen any student other than Arthur around here.

Arthur catches the look and rolls his eyes. "Essay," he says, holding up a sheaf of neatly typed pages.

"Oh. Oh, well. Okay. Good," Merlin says, a bit wrong-footed. "I did say you could email it to me," he points out, taking the essay and passing his eye over the front sheet.

Arthur scoffs and steps forward, leaving Merlin with no choice but to back into the flat.

"Arthur – "

"Shut up," Arthur says firmly, and he kisses Merlin, possessive and hungry and impatient. "I've been in the library all evening writing that stupid essay, and I _demand_ some kind of recompense."

Merlin can't help himself, laughs and sinks into Arthur's kiss, curling his free hand through thick blond hair. Arthur moves back, nipping at Merlin's lower lip and kicking the door shut behind him.

"See, Merlin, if you want to get the hang of this teaching lark," Arthur says, "You're going to have to realise that it's all about the right motivation."

"Oh, I see," Merlin says, and he laughs a little, dropping Arthur's essay onto the table and taking both of Arthur's hands in his, pulling him towards Merlin's bedroom. "Come on, then. I'll motivate you so hard you can't walk straight."

Arthur's laugh is loud and rich and warm, easily pushing aside all thoughts of what's appropriate or professional.


End file.
